With ASKAR SHEIBANI

CEO, Comtek Network Systems and chair, DBF

Climate emergency is the biggest and the most challenging major issue now facing mankind.

It is a ticking time bomb and we all know that if we do nothing it will explode and destroy millions of humans and innocent wildlife.

Mankind has created this monster and has to find a solution to defuse the bomb before it is too late.

We all have to adopt a new way of life and respect the environment and planet earth; abuse is not an option anymore.

Respecting the planet we live on should not lead to lowering our standards of living. If we apply human creativity, we can develop swathes of technologies that would speed up the process of achieving Net Zero and reversing the rise in the earth’s temperature.

The pressure is now on all the industrial nations to come up with effective tech-based innovative solutions. Major universities worldwide have already begun collaborations with relevant industries with substantial support from their governments.

Fortunately, the UK has some of the best universities in the world. This puts the UK in a stronger position than the other nations.

Now is the time for our universities to receive the financial support they so desperately need to help UK technology companies rather than overseas ones such as China and North America.

If we combine our innovative home-grown technology companies, our first-class universities and government support, the UK becomes unbeatable.

We will have the innovation, development and manufacturing of technologies that will help the world to achieve its Net Zero aspiration and at the same time create much needed high-skilled, well-paid jobs.

North Wales, due to its geography, is well placed as an ideal region to become the power hub for innovation and the development of environmental technologies.

There are very few places in the world like North Wales’ coastlines that are amazingly suitable locations for tidal energy infrastructure development.

Whilst we are developing the infrastructure our local universities could easily divert their resources from supporting some overseas companies to our own regional-based industries.

Construction of tidal stream or lagoon technologies will create a hitherto unimaginable platform for North Wales to further enhance and develop its turbine and engineering sectors, hence providing high-quality employment within our communities.

Tidal lagoon technology will create an effective and robust flood defence, protecting our coastal communities against the dangers of flooding.

The energy produced from tidal marine energy is predictable and will create self-reliant, carbon-free energy reducing the UK’s dependency on overseas energy imports and international blackmail.

We have already planned to have Hydrogen hubs in Anglesey and Deeside. To manufacture Green Hydrogen batteries, we need renewable energy resources. Tidal energy will provide the much-needed supply of green energy to produce hydrogen batteries for our trucks, aeroplanes, ships and houses.

We are now facing a historic opportunity to take advantage of our local landscape, universities, and manufacturing expertise and embark on a fascinating, tech-based renewable energy industrial revolution.

We will not only be putting North Wales on the world map as a powerhouse for renewable energy, but we will also be helping planet earth to survive.